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Family & Social Life

Donations to the Museum have preserved irreplaceable evidence about generations of ordinary Americans. Objects from the Copp household of Stonington, Connecticut, include many items used by a single family from 1740 to 1850. Other donations have brought treasured family artifacts from jewelry to prom gowns. These gifts and many others are all part of the Museum's family and social life collections.

Children's books and Sunday school lessons, tea sets and family portraits also mark the connections between members of a family and between families and the larger society. Prints, advertisements, and artifacts offer nostalgic or idealized images of family life and society in times past. And the collections include a few modern conveniences that have had profound effects on American families and social life, such as televisions, video games, and personal computers.

Les Deux Frères by Louise Girard after a drawing by Paul Delaroche (1797–1856) of the children of Monsieur de la Villestreux is executed in the crayon manner, a process invented in France. Using special tools on a plate covered with an etching ground, the artist reproduces a drawing. When printed on the appropriate paper with the right kinds of inks, the reproduction closely resembles the original chalk drawing. The French firm Rittner & Goupil published this print on August 22, 1835. The original artist, Paul Delaroche, painted history subjects and portraits. In his day, he was a popular artist in the academic tradition, and engravings after his paintings sold very well in Britain and the United States.